Technical Succession Planning for Knowledge Workers: Recruiting, Training, Retaining Knowledge Workers and Transferring their Technical Knowledge

Managers have an obligation to get the best value for the money they invest on behalf of their organizations. That is as true for the human side of the business as it is for making investment decisions about machines, technology, or even capital. Systematically and strategically picking the best people, and developing them to make them even more productive, is not something to be put off until a rainy day. It is not something that would be “nice to do” when time permits. It is, instead, essential to gaining and sustaining competitive advantage. While traditional succession planning programs have focused on attracting, developing, retaining and positioning the best High Potential (HiPo) workers, technical succession planning focuses on attracting, developing, retaining, positioning and transferring the knowledge of the best High Professional (HiPro) workers. HiPros are the “go to” people, the in-house experts, on business processes, problems, customers or issues. Traditional succession planning and traditional talent management programs have ignored the critically-important HiPro group. Successful organizations of the future will not be those with the most advanced technology or the most liquid capital. They will, instead, be those that are systematically managing and developing talent—including technical talent such as engineers and research scientists--to gain and sustain competitive advantage. Many HR practitioners are faced with the need to coordinate the start up of a comprehensive succession planning program. However, they often wonder where to start and what to do. This session will provide a detailed approach to guide that start up. While that approach may need to be modified and aligned with each corporate culture, it provides enough details for you to prepare and implement a project plan to implement the technical succession planning program. It goes beyond that traditional focus to add a new, special element—that is, a focus on leveraging the knowledge of HiPros.

• Review how technical talent management differs from, and is similar to, traditional—that is, management-focused—talent management
• Prepare a project plan to implement a technical talent management system
• Identify and develop technical competencies 
• Examine the essential components of a performance management system as part of a technical talent management effort
• Determine how to identify HiPros
• Describe how to leverage the knowledge of HiPros and how to transfer that knowledge
• Review effective recruiting and retention strategies for HiPros

I.    Introduction

• Overview
• Objectives

II.    Implementing a Technical Talent Planning and Management System

• A model to guide technical talent management systems
• New thinking on technical talent models
• The critical importance of competency models in technical talent management
• Recruiting and selecting the best technical talent
• Identifying key hipros
• Appraising and developing the best technical talent
• Positioning the best technical talent
• Retaining the best technical talent
• Transferring the knowledge of technical talent: Approaches
• Activity 

III.    Conclusion

• Summary 
• Final Q & A

Attend this program to discover a new dimension to succession planning that goes beyond preparing people for vertical promotions “up the organization chart” and prepares people for “horizontal promotions” in a dual career ladder system “across the continuum of professional expertise.”

•  Technical managers (such as engineering, IT, accounting, R & D)
•  HR managers who serve technical/professional departments or organizations

William J. Rothwell, PhD, DBA, SPHR, SHRM-SCP, CPTD Fellow, RODC, FLMI is a Distinguished Professor in the
Workforce Education and Development program in the Department of Learning and Performance Systems at the
Pennsylvania State University, University Park campus.
Work Experience
Dr. Rothwell worked full-time in human resources, training and Organization Development in both government (Illinois Office of Auditor General) and in a multinational company (American Brands, #48 on the Fortune 500 list) from 1979 until he joined Penn State University as a professor to head up a graduate program in Human Resource Development/Organization Development He has been a consultant for over 50 multinational companies. Among his many clients are Motorola University China, Ford Motor Company, General Motors, Siemens, Sony, GM Shanghai, Phillips, Erickson, HP, the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), the American Red Cross, Care, the U.S. Department of Labor, the U.S. Postal Service, and many more. He is President of two consulting firms: (1) Rothwell & Associates, Inc. (a firm that focuses on public speaking online and onsite) and (2) Rothwell & Associates, LLC (a firm that focuses on consulting with an emphasis on succession planning, talent management and related topics). He is also, with his wife, a business owner of The Rothwell Partnership, which controls 10 homes for rent. From 1997 until 2022 he and his wife also owned and operated a personal care
home (Greenhills Village and Assisted Living Residence) for the elderly that was licensed by the State of Pennsylvania for 54 residents and employed 27 full-time and part-time employees.
Education and Professional Certifications 
Dr. Rothwell earned his Bachelor’s degree in English with High Honors and Department Honors from Illinois State University; he earned a Master’s degree and completed all courses for the Ph.D. in English from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; he earned his Master of Arts in Business Administration (MABA) from Sangamon State University (a university since renamed the University of Illinois at Springfield); he earned his Ph.D. with a specialization in Human Resource Development from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; and, in 2022 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) by the Alliance International University in Dutch Curaçao in the Caribbean. He has also earned multiple professional certifications: the Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) from the Human Resource Certification Institute; the Society for Human Resource Management Senior Professional in Human Resources (SHRM-SCP); the Registered Organization Development Consultant (RODC) designation from the International Society for
Organization Development and Change; and the Certified Professional in Talent Development (CPTD) Fellow (member of the Hall of Fame) from the Association for Talent Development. He is a Fellow of the Life Management Institute (FLMI) designation based on passing 10 graduate courses in the insurance field. (The latter is essentially a Master’s degree in insurance.)
International Work
Dr. Rothwell has been to China 83 times, to Singapore 32 times, and has visited every continent (except Antarctica) to do training, consulting, college teaching, and research. He has chaired 110 Ph.D. committees at Penn State, has served on doctoral committees at foreign universities in England, China, Australia, and the United Arab Emirates, and is still listed as a visiting professor at Nankai University in Tianjin China, a visiting professor at Shanghai JiaoTong University in Shanghai, and a special speaker at Renmin University in Beijing China. (He taught 10 MBA courses at Nankai University and 10 MBA courses at Beijing University.)
Awards
In 2022 Dr. Rothwell was named a Distinguished Professor in the College of Education, was given the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Organization Development Network, and earned the Global Lifetime Achievement Award by Penn State Global Programs (the university’s highest award for doing work internationally). He received the Distinguished Researcher Award from the College of Education in 2016 and was given the Graduate Faculty Teaching Award in the 2004-2005 academic year. (The teaching award is a single award given to one faculty member on Penn State’s 24 campuses each year.). In 2011 he was given the Association for Talent Development’s Distinguished Contribution to Workplace Learning and Performance Award; in 2016 he received the Best Global Training and Development Leadership Award from the World HRD Congress in India, and in 2014 he was named a Brandlaureate in Malaysia. In 2022 he was given the Lifetime Achievement Award by The OD Network; in 2023 he was inducted into the International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame; in 2024 he was named to Marquis’ Who’s Who in America; and in 2024 he has been notified that he will be given the International Society for Performance Improvement’s (ISPI) Thomas F. Gilbert Distinguished Professional Achievement Award at the 2025
conference. 
Publications and Presentations

Dr. Rothwell has authored, coauthored, edited, or coedited 158 books since 1987 and has delivered over 2,000 professional online and onsite presentations over 30 years in 15 nations. His recent books since 2020 include Succession Planning for Small Business and Family Business, Rethinking Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, High-Performance Coaching for Managers, Organization Development (OD) Interventions: Executing Effective Organizational Change, Virtual Coaching to Improve Group Relationships: Process Consultation Reimagined, Adult Learning Basics 2nd ed., Increasing Learning and Development’s Impact Through Accreditation, The Essential HR Guide for Small Businesses and Startups, and Workforce Development: Guidelines for Community College Professionals, 2nd ed.